


Middle School Mishap

by brotherfuckers



Series: Striderclan [92]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Bullying, Chubby Bro, Flirting, Gen, Original Character - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 08:35:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1812055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brotherfuckers/pseuds/brotherfuckers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bro's childhood had some bumps in it that Bro can now look back on and cringe appropriately about, but one of the events from middle school comes back to say high. First part is set with a 12/13 year old Bro. The second part is when Bro is about 22/23.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Middle School Mishap

The entire time the Lalonde boys were growing up Dick was a stick and Derrick carried a little weight. Dick would shoot up like a weed, sometimes overnight, causing the pants that had fit him just right the day before to look like high waters. Derrick grew steadily which Mom greatly appreciated. Hormones hit them the hardest in middle school, wracking their bodies with changes. Dick’s voice dropped at least two octaves and was the lowest among his classmates until high school. For Derrick, it was his muscles. He was always hungry and stuffing his face as his body craved the calories to burn. Unfortunately that meant that a soft layer developed over everything else and Derrick looked, as the other kids called it, chubby.

To counter the teasing and the ‘cute’ phrase, Derrick developed something of a punk look. Mom indulged him and let him buy the leather jackets and mismatched patterns and helped him distress the already worn clothes from local thrift stores. The shoes were his favorite article of his outfits; union jack steel toed boots.

He also changed the style of his sunglasses, necessary for medical reasons, which was uncool but he couldn’t change that. Instead he changed from the smooth, rounded, safe style to something he briefly saw online which screamed punk at him. Nothing like putting sharp cutting edges on things (even if Mom wouldn’t let him put real spikes on the shoulders of his jacket). The scalene triangle shades were the perfect finishing touch.

His reputation increased around the school as being a punk as he skirted around the rules without actually causing trouble for anyone. The teachers tolerated him as long as he did his work. The kids that teased him were awed by the new cool punk persona he put up. For the most part.

There was a small fraction that hadn’t forgotten the slight rolls of his tummy from when they had to change into their gym clothes in the boys locker room. They usually came at him in packs, jeering at him as they pass him in the hallway or throwing twinkies at him in the lunch room. But every once in a while one of them would test their bravery against Derrick one on one. Derrick usually shot them down in a short manner and they’d run back to their group crowing about how they showed that chubby punk up and Derrick would just roll his eyes at them and move on.

On one such occasion, one of the usual suspects ended up in the little boys’ room alone with Derrick. It was the middle of class so Derrick didn’t think that Jacob, one of the bigger eighth graders, would try anything without his posse to back him up and so he just went about in his business, taking the urinal at the end. Weirdly Jacob took the one next to him.

“Hey fatty.”

Derrick didn’t answer.

“Fatty McFat Fatterson.”

Derrick still refused to acknowledge him.

“Hey fatty, too bad your penis isn’t as fat as the rest of you.”

“What? Stop looking!”

“I’m not looking!”

“That’s weird! Stop looking!”

“I’m not looking! I just said that! I’m not weird!”

“You commented on my thing. That’s fucking weird.”

“I’m not weird!”

Derrick was not expecting the shove that knocks him against the wall. He struggled to get his pants up and just barely did before Jacob was swinging at him. Derrick defensively raised his arms up and the thick jacket helped soften the blow which really just pissed Jacob off enough to make him swing again, this time hard enough to knock Derrick’s hand against his own face.

“Stupid fatty! Why are you hitting yourself?” Jacob sneered down at Derrick.

“Shut it, weirdo!”

Jacob let out a shout of frustration and swung again. And again. And again. He drove Derrick down against the wall, trying to get away from the rain of punches by retreating to the corner next to the urinal, but that just encouraged Jacob to kick him instead.

“I’m NOT weird!” Jacob shouted with one last kick before storming out of the bathroom. Derrick stayed crouched for a little while longer, willing the tears to dry up and hoping that Jacob wouldn’t bring anyone back with him. He finally climbed out, feeling grody from the closeness with the plumbing but after checking, he found that his jacket wasn’t ruined. Some more checks and he’s sure that he wasn’t bleeding anywhere, just going to bruise a lot along his forearms and shins. He went back to class and was quiet the rest of the day as he plotted his revenge.  

His bad mood continued all the way through going home. He slammed the front door and threw his bag down on the ground. He stomped all the way to the kitchen, interrupting Dick recounting his day to Mom. The two of them stared at Derrick as he angrily moved about the kitchen, but no explanation was forthcoming. After grabbing a snack he stomped off to his room. Mom and Dick briefly exchanged looks before Dick went after his brother to get to the bottom of things.

He found his little brother face planted across his bed with barely audible groans muffled by the comforter. After a little wheedling, Dick managed to get the story out of Derrick and comforted him through changing out of the grimy outfit and the showing of bruises. Eventually Derrick cheered up enough to go back downstairs to properly greet Mom. Dick silently promised to fill her in later.

Soon after dinner though, Derrick locked himself away in his room, claiming to have some sort of project that he needed to finish.

A few sizable stacks of paper later Derrick was finished with his ‘project’ and ready to wreck some shit in the process of presenting it to his classmates.

He didn’t know how he managed to flawlessly request an early ride to school, but he got one, back pack full and ready for the vengeance he rightfully deserved. With his early arrival he didn’t have to worry about anyone seeing him and he made quick work of starting at the front, working his way back through the halls of the middle school. Poster after poster was carefully taped to the walls. There was a small crowd of students by the time he finished.

He made sure every poster was put up, couldn’t have any in his backpack and expect to not get blamed. Not that he was sure it mattered much, as he walked back toward the front, where some sixth graders were gathered in a tight huddle, ogling and whispering quietly amongst themselves over a piece of paper Derrick definitely recognized.

He hoped that they would be able to pick Jacob out of a crowd with that picture on the poster, it was last year’s yearbook photo, which Derrick was happy to have found in the glossy pages of prepubescent individuals who were forced to dress up and smile for one day. But that wasn’t all that donned the poster; under that smiling face of crooked teeth and braces was the word, in colorful Microsoft font, “weirdo”. Surely Derrick imagined that would get his message across.

It wasn’t much longer until the halls were filled up, and others were looking over the posters in admiration, astonishment and sincere confusion. Derrick caught the occasional giggles, the questions of who had done it and, soon enough, the loud exclamation of “What the hell!?” followed by the sweet chorus of paper being ripped off walls by an angry teen, scorned in the highlight of his middle school career.

* * *

Three months later Jacob stopped showing up to school.

Derrick felt a little bit of guilt over it, hoping that his actions hadn’t led to Jacob’s dropping out. The commotion from Derrick’s posters had calmed down weeks ago. Jacob didn’t come after Derrick again though so the gambit looked like it had worked. Derrick had to put the incident out of his mind shortly as finals were soon approaching.

* * *

Bro was wandering around the mall with a couple of bags already in his hands. The twins had been going through shirts like nobody’s business. And then he happened to see the sale on jeans. And that particular style of belt that D liked. And a cute gadget to send home for Roxy. And the book in the window was just calling for him to buy it for Rose. He honestly hadn’t meant to buy all of that. He just came for shirts. He was on his way to the exit, trying to escape the siren call of those boots across the way in yet another store, when he stepped around a gaggle of school girls and was thrown into the middle of the breeze way.

Bro sent a quick prayer up to the booty gods for their bit of intervention when up ahead he sees a cute ass standing in line at one of the coffee carts. Not even the mannequins in the stores were showing off jeans as nicely as this guy was. And his waist was just the right size for Bro to want to wrap his hands around. Bro quickly schemed on how to get in the cutie’s way so he could check out the rest of him.

Bro timed his entrance just as the guy was turning away from the counter with his drink, positioning himself so that they’d both had react in order to keep from colliding. Bro was sure of his movements and kept his bags away from any flung drops of coffee while taking the opportunity to take in more of the young man. He was about Bro’s age give or take a few years, and definitely kissable in a way that Bro would love to take him home if he didn’t have the twins ready to bother him at any given moment. They could be such cockblocks sometimes.

The guy got a good look at Bro as well. “Oh hey!” he exclaimed.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” Bro tipped his head in return, faking embarassment at almost being run over. But he didn’t leave the scene. Now that hotness was confirmed, Bro needed to see if he was interested..

“No wait, I know you.” The guy gestured to his own face where glasses would be and Bro figures that he indicating the odd shape of Bro’s because how many other people walk around with sharp angles on their face. “Uh, Derrick, right?”

Bro froze at the name. Everyone in Houston knew him as Bro. Why would anyone call him Derrick here?

“Yeah,” the guy nodded, “we went to school together. We kind of didn’t get along, to put it mildly.” He scratched the back of his head absently.

Bro quickly thought back to his school experiences, the drama from high school flooding his mind. Didn’t get along would be the understatement of the year if he was who Bro thought he was. Anger flared up inside of him and his fists would be balled up tightly if they weren’t already carrying the bags. It wouldn’t be that hard to fling them down to the ground to take a very overdue swing at him. Bro was trying to place a name to the face, running through the suspects.

“Terry? Cristian?” Those were the closest that Bro could place.

“Who?”

The question threw Bro off. “High school?”

“Ah, nope. Middle school. Never quite got to high school.”

Bro’s mind caught on the new fact. So he wasn’t one of the few from that incident. He quickly backtracked as fast as he could, reaching back ten years to fuzzy ass memories. The teasing came to the forefront and Bro cringed a bit at his own chubby punk stage. He ran through the faces of the time, staying slightly awkwardly still in the middle of the mall. But then it clicked.

“Jacob.” The guy he possibly chased out of middle school with a handful of posters calling him ‘weirdo’ which probably wasn’t the nicest thing to do to someone especially when saying that to his face garnered Bro a set of bruises that lasted about a half month.

“Yup.”

“Oh... well shit...”

“I’m glad you remembered me,” Jacobs smile was soft and not judgemental. But that didn’t stop the guilt that rose up again. In fact, thinking about it, Bro could almost feel the bruises on his arms and legs again. And he remembered cleaning up that leather jacket too. If Jacob hadn’t dropped out of school, Bro would feel nothing but righteousness over his retaliation that bought him some peace through the end of the year, after which the rest of puberty caught up and put that little bit extra towards good use, sculpting him mostly into what he looked like today.

“Yeah I remember ya,” Bro replied guardedly.

“Well, I’m glad I actually ran into you, Derrick. I’ve always kinda wanted to apologize for what happened. I didn’t mean to start anything. Just... shit was going down in my life. And I reacted poorly.”

“Huh.”

“My dad kinda got really ill. Like. I think when... that happened, he had like eight months to live. And my mom wasn’t handling it well. She got all sorts of angry. And took it out on me like it was my fault Dad got sick. It wasn’t, but I was the brat running around, I was the extra mouth to feed. She really didn’t hit me. Not hard or anything. But she’d yell at me. And call me weird. I was the weird kid who didn’t deserve a dad like mine.”

Bro felt his gut drop out. He had no idea. No wonder that insult stung him so badly. Bro had apparently targeted on the one thing that would have hurt the most.

“And I just kinda snapped at you, I guess. Never got to say sorry before I had to drop out. I was an upset little kid with shitty grades and the farm down the street needed an extra hand. So I got a job to support the family until my dad died and then to support my mom after he died. Only had to do that for a year before she was gone too. I think she died out of spite really.”

Bro got another wave of guilt because that situation was fucked up and Bro totally didn’t help with any of it. “Shit. I was an ass,” Bro drew out the last word, kinda hating himself for his previous actions. “That was a dick thing for me to do afterwards.”

“Dude, yeah, you were an ass,” Jacob softened his words with a smile and joking tone, “but I got over it. Like, I kicked your ass, you called me a name. Fair trade.”

“Still,” Bro felt the guilt despite the apparent forgiveness. “That was a shit thing for me to do. Bullyin’ ‘gainst bullyin’ ain’t ever right. I’m sorry. I didn’t know that was goin’ on. I wouldn’t have done anythin’ had I known. Damn, I’m sorry.”

“Seriously, it’s okay. No big. I’m over it. It’s not like I broadcasted my situation out. Not even my friends really knew what was going on.”

“Fuck. But you’re doin’ alright now?”

“Mostly. It’s a long story.”

“Hey, I got time. And you got coffee. Wanna sit down?” Bro gestured at the nearby tables, happy with the thought that he’d be able to set the bags down.

“Sure.” Jacob smiled and Bro’s mind immediately went to other suggestions he could offer but refrained somehow from letting them spill out.

Over the next hour or so, they caught each other up on what had transpired over the last ten years between them. Jacob had it rough being tossed into the foster system but had landed a very supportive family who helped through college. He was now working for a local manufacturing plant working as the production manager. Bro told him about the move from New York to Houston with his brothers and Jacob joked that he was the cool dad without actually knocking anyone up and Bro just huffed at the comparison as Jacob laughed and told him that he thought it was cool and admitted that he had an older brother in his foster family that was just like that as well.

Overall it sounded like Jacob was doing much better and was no longer the bratty bully that he was back in middle school.

“Hey I still feel shitty about the posters and I know that you’ve told me to stop apologizin’ over them but still, I want to do something to make up for it. Doesn’t sound like ya need anythin’ now but in case somethin’ comes up, can I give ya my number?”

“Well that makes it easy on me.” Jacob smirked at him. “I was gonna ask you for your number anyways. Not for the favor but for... well... if you are interested...” Bro found the blush that showed up on Jacob’s face to be the hottest thing about the guy so far. He didn’t answer immediately because his brain was still reeling from the sudden change. Within the space of their meeting, Bro had gone from eyeing the hot piece of cute ass that he wanted to get into his bed to thinking he was one of the high school assholes and planning on seeing how fast he could eat dirt to oops wrong guy but still on the bully list to oh shit Bro fucked up and did something pretty damn tacky back to having the hot piece of cute ass wanting him. Bro could feel his own blush creep up on his face.

Finally his brain caught up with his dick. “Hell yeah, I’m interested. Totally down.” They couldn’t go back to Bro’s place as D wasn’t home and the brats would be soon from school. He would have to call the sweet ladies down the hall to cover for him if anything was going to happen this afternoon. “Uh, your bed?” Bro blurted out before mentally smacking himself for his lack of etiquette. “I mean, or we could get coffee first?”

Jacob smiled and lifted up his empty coffee cup.

****  
  


**Author's Note:**

> For more information please check out our work at striderclan.tumblr.com; we have more stories, head canons, art/pictures.


End file.
